The New Zealand Herald AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1864.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 243, 23 August 1864, Page 2

The New Zealand Herald

AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1864.

SPECTE3XTO AGENDO. " Give every man thine car, but few thy voice: Take cach man's censure, but thy judgment. This above all, —To thiue ownself be true And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man."

the commencement of tlie present wfti< in Isew Zealand a small coalition, party in the colony, sufficiently united to enable it to pull together, though having distinct objects in view—one section aiming simply at political capital by the disorganization if possible of its opponents in office; the other at the preservation of certain vested interests iii the " protection" line, sought to be achieved through attempting every conceivable obstruction to the spread of a healthy European settlement of the country —has laboured incessantly and persistently to make the impression on the public mind at home that the contest is characterized by a condition of intensified illfeeling between the settlers and the natives. No better refutation of this most insincere and mischievous calumny need be found llian that contained in the announcement in our issue of Tuesday last, of the desire of the Tauranga natives lately in rebellion, that the whole of their lands in that district should be thrown open by sale to European occupation, and that they themselves should not be located on their reserves in a manner to isolate them from the pakeha, but that henceforth they should mix freely both in person and property with the white population. The people of this country are in no way surprised at such a demonstration of confidence in themselves from such a quarter and at such a time, though doubtless after much of what they have read upon the subject it will seem somewhat inconsistent to simple minded people in Eugland, and not a little tantalizing, we are persuaded, to a few folk nearer home who we may suppose will sorely deprecate the wilfulness of their lately persecuted proteges in thus irreverently and inconsiderately tempting providence. .And will the lamb, so recently the victim' of " terrorism," " pursued," " despoiled," "hunted" and "robbed," at last find shelter behind the cover of the wolf? Should he not rather seek refuge in the sylvan recesses of those ample " piotec-tion" reserves on whose dimensions, for his sake, so much care had been expended, and whose boundaries were to be fenced in with such consummate jealousy against all aggressors? Has he no more anxiety for his safety, and no gratitude for his friends ? Alas tor the stability of what only is human ! "While the Maori Was bent solely upon folly and contempt of the proprieties of civilised life, he courted the "protection" of ghostly guides and zealous political sympathisers, willing if they cotilsl to move Heaven and earth on his behalf, but when the Iruitlesncss of his schemes become apparent, and the adoption of another course is detei mined on, the pakelia assumes a new character in his eyes, his former " want of confidence" so distressing to hear of, suddenly disappears, and he trnsts himself in our hands with a heartiness and good will as suggestive, at least, as it is uulooked for and astonishing. The recurrence, we think, proves conclusively what we have all along maintained, that the difficulties which beset colonization in 2vew Zealand are not attributable to inlic rent badness in the native people thti*iselves, and certainly not, as has been wickedly iiJifJ libellously asserted by interested parties here and in England, to anything like popular antipathy between the two races, bus chiefly, if indeed not solely, to the habi? of inveterate intennedling with Maori poli-* tics of a class of persons who apparently for Svant of better employment, and not content with the space to which their particular profession calls them, are for eve? fishing up old grievances, or " advising" new i grounds of complaint. There has been no end to the novelties in civil government to which this abuse has not given rise. If common sense suggested that one law and one punishment for the trasgression of law should be made applicable alike to both races in the colony, these people and their congeners the local government opposition party, immediately interpose, and tell us the natives must make their own laws, they must have given them separate " Institutions," sham courts' " Commissioners" and what not. Again, if all human experience points out that the civil amalgamation of the races is desirable, and that this can be brought only in a natuaral way by annulling iC S' I distinction, discountenancing tribal communion, and breaking up by degrees tho exclusiveness and barbarism engendered by the " native district protection" system—we are assured peremptorily that this would ne\ er work, the settlers and the Maori must be kepu distinct and separatefrom each other; wc:nu»B have Native districts, European Bajahs, loca.residents, and we suppose the whole jpf.ra - phernalia of distinct independent Maorinoiuin our midst, so that scope may be atl'oi'dcu for the devolopement of the latent talent of linguists and doctors of every degree, and a ready medium found for the annual dissipation of the handsome native civil list wluch we presume the colony would be permittee to supply. ]Necd we say these kind of doiugs have made the Maori difficult to governHis natural sense and strength of character have been undermined by a sytem ot tutc- . lage the tendency, we had almost said the design, of which is to perpetuate his dependence. Endowed with aspirations not unworthy a citizen and a man, and which under judicious supervision would long since ha\e made him both, it has been the deligat 0 his instructors rather to discourage his precosity, to tighten hi» leiding-slrings, al3 ' 1 protract indefinitely the term oi h?.s pohticP-

"k P y] )o od. All tliis is done professedly to " protect" the unlive, cliielly as nu unfledged landowner, against the profligacy and rapacity of the colonists. It has had the very natural effect, however, of rendering him dissatisfied vith 'his position. It has had the ell'ect, moreover, of accustoming him to undervalue the authority of lav, to treat vitli contempt •uul' ridicule a power that persevered to exhibit a one-sided administration of justice, am l finally to defy openly and confessedly the restraint oven of that political civilization which he had at one time acknowledged. Yet, in spite of this experience, notwithstanding a " native himself has suffered through the system, and the injury and loss for rears heaped upon the colonists from j| ( - suite cause, so inveterate is the habit 0 f political tinkering in this country in ~,01-vthiiii; that relates to the Maori people, lli.-it'wc arc persuaded if the colonists submitted t" tl-.c intolerable imposition, it •,\\mid to-morrov, without hesitation or compunction, be inflicted upon them through the intrigues of the same old identitv. "N'c'sce that the Maoris at length are

h'.'inniii£ 10 protest against this cruel \u-oiii: to"themselves. They have just re<iiitcd the tirsi inceptive attempt'at Tau<hcm in from community witlT the new settlers in that district, and a't the present moment, we believe, are begging the Government to buy up their surplus ] ;I ,uls and permit them to participate with their European fellow-subject s in the common rights of Englishmen —that of doing what thov ill with their own. To be set at lllvVtv in this pavricular would prove a boon 10 the native. It would inspire him with new lite, and furnish hiiu with new motives to industry and activity. It would make hiin ted he never felt before, that at ua>t 1.0 is regarded as a man. Clean escaped f r , ;!; tiie trammels of the Hour and sugar !.,;!cv— relieved for ever of the humiliating oinM-ier.sness of dependence \ipon others. I.i» latent energies would be aroused, and his individuality become realised, in the conviction that, like other men, lie was at last threv.ii upon his own resources. lt'ov.iv tlie 3lnori were fortunate enough to Miroiiiplish this for himself, we would have no tear for his future or for our own. It is i ;: V desire, we believe, if only the " kindness ~fhis friends" will allow it. that he should alone. In most respects he is keenly i tinuii'tis. and properly so, of his European ::tid:! > ""i'>. I 1 true he has come short of this heretofore ill the two important partieuk.:> of industry ainl loyally—but wherefore: For vears he has been systcmatieallv '-cliooled to despise Uritish law, while since his first coming in contact with us as a government he has been accustomed to have al; his wants anticipated and supplied. Thus his luvalty has been tampered with, and the n>oti\'e to industry has been well nigh destroyed. "\Ye\lo hope to see the reversal of all this, as one of the first fruits of the war. If it is i:ot done, we are persuaded it will be our own fault. The Maori will not, and never woulr.. if allowed to act for himself, have stood in the way. The impracticable element in his character, we believe, is more his misfortune than his fault. lie has long been ltii>n!td. partly by well-meaning but injudicious friends.partly by designing intriguers lent on serving themselves at his expense. These persons have been the very parasites of the unhappy New Zealander. They have battened on his ignorance, they have made merchandise of his indolence, they have alienated him by a long course of training from European manners, speech, and modes "f life : and to crown their wickedness have industriously and persistently laboured for vcars to widen the breach between the races

l-v irress calumniation and systematic perversion of facts. One of those hackneyed slanders on tlie colonists which through their connections at l:i nn- they have been in the habit of reproducing from time to time in England, we have glanced at in the course of our remarks. From a late i: review" of Xew Zealand affairs in one of ihe periodicals over which these parties have inlluence we copy such phrases as the following:—"On the whole very hitter feelings seem to exist on both sides."' '"The feeling against thenatives in the colony is rather on the increase." " "When the feeliii;_ r s of hostility against them (the natives) shall have subsided," &c., &c. AVc might, in fact, quote columns of similar base and most unfounded imputations of the same character from this and other publications whose inspiration is equally well-known in the colony, to sav nothing of the 11 damned niirirer"' speeches impudently and insultingly put in the mouths of colonists by men who are not ashamed to utter " ignorant falsehood" in the British House of Commons, and this by way of dramatising their 1111'•haritaMess and giving eclat to their own ill-natured misconceptions. A~o more mischievous calumny on botli parties could be perpetrated —none more calculated to add fuel to the fire which war has ah-early kindled in the colony—war brought about not by " ill blood" between the colonist and the Maori (another favourite phrase by the way of the peace-makers), but liv the vacillating, demoralising policy ot the Home Government, of which it had been forewarned a thousand times. II space permitted wo might quote in-i-'.ancos innumerable in which the evidence I would be overwhelming in proof of the libel of_ which we complain. But we are satisfied with the one we have alluded to at the commencement of these remarks. It is but another of the many incidents in connexion with the history of our relations with the natives of this country, which go to prove that if left to themselves under the management of equal laws, and by the force of W'imnon interests, the two races would long fcince have understood each other, and instead of estrangement, jealousy, and war by class distinction and ex'ept ional rights, there would have been '"own amongst them only the peace and Prosperity which attends upon healthy lu.ilry-, and upon the pursuance in a, just (.nristiiui spirit of a mutual career of honourable industry.